Thursday, June 14, 2007

Observations, Upon Reaching a Lace Milestone

Ladies and gentlemen, the final row of the christening shawl center is complete.

A round of plain stockinette should not take a full week, but this one did. Hey, I've been busy. I had company, I got a new job, "South Park" was on, the sun was in my eyes, Dolores and Victorine are sewing costumes in the living room and Harry choked on a bugle bead, there are nine hundred unread e-mails in my box...you know, the usual.

As I prepare to begin the edging, it seems appropriate to pause and commit to electronic immortality the lessons I have learned while working the center square and borders.

Knitting swatches is vital to the success of a lace project.

Knitting swatches is a waste of time, because swatches fucking lie.

Do not knit from the center of a center-pull ball of laceweight. It will snarl beyond rescue, and you will attempt to kill the next person you see.

Ted was right. Don't count rows, count pattern repeats. If you count rows, you will stop knitting entirely and stare out the window at all the people walking by who are not knitting lace, and try to imagine a time when you, too, will not be knitting lace, and decide this time will never come, and consider stabbing yourself with both ends of your Addi Turbo.

Yay for you 'Frank' ( i see your visitor called you that..in my mind you are Franklin still :P )You must feel like you've climbed a lace mountain!You like opera? have you seen this utube?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0dzZTPWrSM

I swear, I shall never, ever, ever knit lace around curious toddlers or grabby old women. Which latter may be difficult, as I'm well on my way to becoming a grabby old woman. Congrats on ending the center! Is this anything like contemplating a mandala???

And yowsa, poor David; but it sounds like you took good care of him once you got hold of him. [g]

Were the grabby old woman hanging around the rear-deltoid machine at the gym? If so, I'd like to introduce them to some gawking old geezers who hang out at my gym. I swear I'm going to put googly eys on my workout shirts.

Well, I have remembered the cryptic remark about the meeting with the bosses and how you never followed up on it. It has been nagging at me since and I knew at some point you'd make a reference that would clarify the situation. You have. I want to hear all about it.

I have learned some of your points from my daughter, Jen, because I'm too wussy to start a lace project.

Congratulations on your new situation and the new "company" and your entire life. I look forward to meeting you at SM (that's Stitches Midwest, thanks)

Oh nice. New job, visitor, near-death-experience-with-a-bugle-bead and you leave us hanging? Thanks.

I'm in the midst of my first real lace experience and would only add that if you're knitting with cobweb-weight yarn, put on glasses whether you wear them or not. You'll need them by the time the project is over (if not by the end of the 3rd row).

#3 is painfully true. Not so long ago I threw a skein and project still on needles across the room and swore like a sailor to my husband ("Throw the damn stuff out, it's not worth it!!") Bless him, he sat for the rest of the evening picking out the knots and rewound the ball and told me I wasn't to touch it until my demeanor was a little nicer (the yarn is still in its baggie untouched).

I agree with you on the nupps too. Shoot, I agree with you on all the points.

I've never understood the whole center pull concept. I knit from the outside so it doesn't collapse on itself halfway-through. I mean, really, what's supposed to support a half-knitted ball of yarn if you've pulled the yarn from the center? You're just asking for a snarl. Knit from the outside, and the ball just gets smaller but doesn't collapse. (I knit for years before I even realized that other people knit from the center.)

Wow congrats on new job, can't wait to hear more. And this whole list made me laugh. Fair warning for my inevitable eventual descent into lace. RE: counting stitches -- I read the section from the Yarn Harlot's book on not being interrupted when counting stitches and now my husband always says "The dryer's on fire!" when he hears me counting.

Also good to know not to pull lace yarn from the center. For the person who asked why you would ever pull from the center -- for non-lace, where you want the yarn to be fully relaxed, pulling the yarn from the center helps the yarn to further relax as it squooshes into the center. Also it doesn't roll around when you pull more out. Works great for sock yarn.

Congrats on the new job - and what it is about NYC to Chicago or Chicago to NYC that seems to lure all the air travel gremlins out to play hell with our plans? I mean, in theory it's a painless 2 hr. flight, but it almost never seems to go that way...

OK - regarding the new job, think the 5 Ws: who what where when why?ALL o' us inkwiring minds need to know. You realize too, do you not, we're perched white-knuckled at our keyboards waiting to see pictures of the lace? It'll inspire some of us to try knitting lace - and the rest to return to the comfort of our warshrags...

Have I mentioned how much I love reading your blog? I may have, but in the event I have not, let me just say, I love reading your blog. I love it when you leave your posts up for a day or two. I love to come back and re-read them. "Just bind off and call it a doily" was the total crack-up line for me this time. But it was all the fun leading up to it, and following, that I also truly enjoy. Thanks, thanks, thanks for another wonderful read. MaryB

Oh, Franklin. Raising my needles to you in solidarity...got some lace going on over here, chock full o'nupps. (And hey, where did you sneak the nupps in, anyway? I don't remember them being part of your original plan...)

I want that put on my headstone. Nupps are only on every third entrelac rectangle of the(otherwise quite lovely) Forest Path Stole. I'd cringe as I started each and every one of those rectangles. I guess I finally learned enough to LOOSELY add those stitches on the prior row, but I still did an ecstatic jig when the final nupp was done.

I have not yet tried a large lace knitting project, but reading your entries is both petrifying and educational. Today I learned about nupps! (thank you for providing the click through - these tiny things mean so much to me!) congrats on the new job!!!

you have too many comments for me to see if someone has already suggested the addi lace turbos for your lace knitting. It makes the nupp-ing SO MUCH MORE pleasant. I hated the nupps. i was cursing Nancy Bush for making such beautiful Estonian lace patterns that I wanted to re-create but was getting hand cramps from dealing with all those effing nupps. Seriously. They make nupps almost enjoyable.

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